


Way Ahead Way Behind

by Gray_Days



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Character Death, F/F, F/M, Suicide mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-18
Updated: 2014-07-18
Packaged: 2018-02-09 09:24:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,908
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1977642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gray_Days/pseuds/Gray_Days
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Y'know, there's a lot of ways people deal with the death of a teammate," says the last person in the troop bay. He returns everyone else's attention with a friendly nod, crossing his legs comfortably. "Not all of them healthy, obviously! And trust me, whoo, I've seen some pretty destructive coping methods." He laughs lightly. "I mean, it's a stressful event, and the thing about stress is you've gotta burn it off somehow or it'll fester, right here." He pats his chestplate. "Fighting, drinking, making jokes, making...well, I won't be crude, but you all know where I'm going with this!"</p>
<p>"Is that your coping method, Florida?" York asks, with a wry twist to his lip.</p>
<p>Florida laughs again. "Who, me? Nah, I could never. Can't really get into the spirit, you know? No, I put in a few hands of poker."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Way Ahead Way Behind

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [fanart of the freelancers playing poker](http://epsilongrif.tumblr.com/post/89286280215/freelancers-playing-what-appears-to-be-space-age) by epsilongrif.

The group in the back of the Pelican is deathly fucking silent for the first forty-five minutes of the return flight. Everyone tries not to look at Maine, whose white armor is slicked with drying blood. He picks at it occasionally with a gloved finger in a general gesture toward trying to keep it from setting into the grooves where it'll be a bitch to clean out later. Judging by how little effort he's putting into it, he doesn't have much confidence in the idea.

The silence is broken by South's growl. "What a fucking _asshole_."

"That's quite a way to speak of the dead, my dear girl," murmurs Wyoming.

"She deserves it," she snaps. "Activating an armor enhancement in the field without a pipeline to command? An _untested_ armor enhancement? A _teleportation_ enhancement? Oregon was basically _asking_ to get pulped."

Beside her in his harness, North puts a hand to his forehead and tips his head back until it hits the wall, chuckling dryly.

Wyoming glances toward the twins. "Afraid I don't get the joke, chum."

"I was a few yards away when she got pinned," York explains. He finally pops the seal on his helmet, the first of the group, and runs his fingers through his hair so that it stands up in short spikes. "And she ended up by Maine and North. No line of sight, right?"

North nods, helmet scraping the wall behind him. "And right into the snipe that was heading for me, still smoking. Must not have been watching her motion trackers, either." Maine rumbles and North adds, "Yeah, nice catch. Never figured you for a baseball player."

"Wasn't," Maine grunts.

"Hell of a thing to laugh about," muses Wyoming.

This time it's South who laughs, a short, derisive bark. "Right. Because you're so _goddamn_ broken up about it. When was the last time you shed a tear over someone dying? Or are you just so _glad_ to have new material for, for your stupid _jokes_ —"

"Who's there," he says immediately.

"That wasn't a suggestion, you dumb—"

Her voice is drowned out by a yell from the cockpit. "Hey, this is your captain telling you to keep it the fuck down back there. Some of us are busy making sure we dock at the right ship. Eat some peanuts or in-flight snacks or something, jesus christ."

"We get peanuts?" asks the new kid. "Nobody told me we get peanuts." No one answers him.

After a few moments of silence, York says, "Hey, Wyoming. Knock knock."

"Who's there, old chap?"

"Teleport."

"Teleport who?"

"Tele-poor taste."

Wyoming actually slaps his knee, hitting his chestplate against his harness as he doubles over chortling.

"Y'know, there's a lot of ways people deal with the death of a teammate," says the last person in the troop bay. Everyone turns to look at him except Wyoming, who's still trying to stop laughing. He returns their attention with a friendly nod, crossing his legs comfortably. "Not all of them healthy, obviously! And trust me, whoo, I've seen some pretty destructive coping methods." He laughs lightly. "I mean, it's a stressful event, and the thing about stress is you've gotta burn it off somehow or it'll fester, right here." He pats his chestplate. "Fighting, drinking, making jokes, making...well, I won't be crude, but you all know where I'm going with this!"

"Is that your coping method, Florida?" York asks, with a wry twist to his lip.

" _That's_ Florida?" says New Kid.

Florida laughs again. "Who, me? Nah, I could never. Can't really get into the spirit, you know? No, I put in a few hands of poker." He turns to the new kid and adds, "Sure am, Wash. Can I call you Wash?"

"I, uh — I mean, sure?" He sounds faintly stunned to be addressed at all.

"I am simply thrilled to meet you, Wash. I've heard so much about you, and it's just great as all get-out to find out that only half of it's true."

"Th– wait, what?"

"And walk away with the pot, right, Florida?" North hasn't moved, his head still tipped back against the bulkhead. Beside him, South is sunk into her seat glowering, arms crossed, silent under her helmet.

Florida clicks his tongue in admonition. "Now let's not blow things out of proportion! Reading body language is a skill anyone can learn with enough smarts and effort, and I don't think I've ever met anyone who's as smart or who works as hard as you folks!"

"I'll take that wager, mate," Wyoming says mildly.

York looks back and forth between them. "Well, nuts. That's the rest of us out, I guess."

"Iunno." North finally tips his head forward again and settles himself more comfortably. The motion is deliberate, to the point of artificiality. "It's been a while since I lost my shirt. Might make an interesting change."

Everyone present looks at South, Maine with only a slight tilt of the head from where he's sitting across from her, Wash late and a little warily once he notices the direction everyone else's helmets are pointing. She raises her head slowly to meet the reflective visors facing her, then flips off the whole ship. "Wow. Stick it up your asses."

"Is that a promise, my dear?"

South pulls off her helmet and leans forward toward Wyoming, staring at him through her bangs with her teeth bared in an aggressive grin. "Sure. For you? Without lube."

"Well, this looks like a real party already," sighs York. "Count me among the living who're staying at the other end of the ship."

Glancing down at the blackened pile of armor on the bloody floor, South responds, "Nice. Really batting a thousand tonight, York."

"Buckle up, boys and girls, we're docking in a minute," comes 479er's voice, echoing in the bay. "Well. Fifteen seconds. Better be quick."

"Thanks for the warning," mutters Wash.

The whine of the engines dies down as the ship bumps and then settles on the floor of the hangar. Maine is up first, picking up Oregon's remains and slinging them over his shoulder. Soot flakes off her armor onto the bloodstained pauldron it's resting against. "Oh, that's awful," Florida clucks sympathetically.

"The usual location?" Wyoming asks, ducking under his harness as it clunks back into resting position.

"I don't see why not!" Florida beams. "In, oh, say, an hour and a half? Give everyone time to freshen up and hand this poor girl off to the appropriate people."

"I'm game," says North. "South?"

South is silent, still sitting in her seat, twisting the toe of her boot in the bloodstain on the Pelican's deck. She looks up at her brother's voice. "What...? Oh. Yeah. Sure. Whatever."

"I'll stay back here for a little while," he tells the others. "Meet up with you guys later."

"What's up?" 479er hops down from the loading ramp and glances around at the Freelancers. "You guys planning a wake?"

"Interested in joining us, madame? North here intends to lose his shirt."

"Ohhh, no." The pilot puts her hands up and takes a few steps back. "Thanks, but no thanks. Not if you and the blue guy are involved. I know my limits."

York offers her a lopsided grin, resting his helmet against his hip. For all his affected ease, the expression shows strain at the corners. "See? That's one smart woman. Might want to revise your estimate, Florida." Florida shrugs.

Maine makes a low, pantherine sound, looking down at Wash beside him. Wash, in turn, looks up at him, then at the rest of the group. "What. Really? I mean, everyone made it sound..." Maine tilts his free hand, then shrugs, jostling Oregon. ("You people are ruining my fucking floor," says 479er.) "Well, I guess if you say so...I'm not giving up any clothes again, though. Just saying."

"Joining in?" Florida asks brightly. "Good man. The more, the merrier, right?" He goes to slap Maine's shoulder, then thinks better of it and pats the small of his back instead. "We'll keep a pair of seats open for you two."

Maine twitches slightly at the touch but nods to both of them, then steps away to deposit Oregon on the medical gurney being wheeled in at the end of the hangar.

York looks at all of them, running his fingers through his hair again and rearranging the spikes into a new configuration. "Well. Lemme know how it goes when I see half of you broke and wasted tomorrow. I'm out." He drops a two-fingered salute and ambles off in Maine's wake.

"Wait," Wash says, and sprints off to catch up with Maine. As they exit the hangar, he can be heard asking, "Where's the usual location?"

"Well, I'll see you folks soon. Young Wash has the right idea, I think." Florida raises a hand in farewell before turning away.

"Don't you two stay out here too long. Wouldn't want to miss the fun," Wyoming tells the twins.

"Don't worry, we won't," replies North, leaning against the Pelican's bay and looking back at his sister.

"Rightio, good show."

 

Connecticut meets Wash and Maine in the locker rooms, where Maine has his armor off and is cleaning the last of the blood off one of the boots. Wash is sitting a few feet away watching him with his elbows resting on his knees, kitted back up in helmet and all. The rest of Maine's armor is lying in a neat pile by his feet. Connie sits down across from them. "So how'd it go? I saw Wyoming and Florida walking out on my way in, but they seemed, well, a little bit preoccupied."

Wash looks up. Maine doesn't. "Oh. Well…" He hesitates. "Oregon died. And we're...playing poker, I think?"

"Oh, no." Connie's face crumples, and she squeezes her lips together for a few seconds, looking down at her hands. When she looks up again, she says, "What happened?"

"Teleport accident." Maine pinches his fingernail into the cloth he's using and runs it along a groove in the boot parallel to the sole.

"She tried to teleport without line-of-sight and came out right in front of a sniper bullet," Wash explains, when Maine doesn't seem inclined to continue.

"Damn it." There's a raw catch in her voice when she speaks, dropping her head and letting her bangs cover her face. When she speaks again, her tone is more under control, if not entirely even. "Poor Oregon. What about everyone else? Was anyone hurt?"

"Not too badly that I could tell. A few scrapes and broken ribs. The whole thing with Oregon came kinda out of nowhere." Wash watches Maine clean for a few minutes, then says, "The poker was the blue– I mean, Agent Florida's idea. He said it'd help grieve, I guess. Most of us who were on the mission are playing in about twenty minutes."

"I guess that's how it goes at times like this. Poker...that sounds like him." She shakes her head. "Sitting around just thinking about it doesn't do anyone much good."

Wash coughs. "Do you want to come? There's probably room. You knew Oregon pretty well, didn't you?"

"Yeah." Connie takes a deep breath, then nods. "Yes, Wash, I do, and yes, I did. Where are you playing?"

Wash glances at Maine, then says weakly, "The usual location?"

"Oh, I know where that is. Don't worry, I'll lead you there. You'll be able to find it pretty easily after the first time."

"Oh, thank god," Wash says fervently. "This big fucker's terrible with directions."

Maine and Connie snort at the same time before Maine puts the boot down and folds up the bloodstained cloth in his hand. "Done."

"Then suit up and let's go." Connie stands and offers her hand to Wash, who takes it and lets her pull him up. "I hope you're ready to lose everything you own, Agent Washington."

"You know, he keeps saying that's not going to happen but I'm really not sure I believe him."

Connie nods wisely. "You really shouldn't."

"Um. Oh. Is it too late for me to back out?"

Connie hooks her elbow into his and pats his shoulder. "Yes, Agent Washington, it really is. You're committed now."

"Oh. Well. Hell." He sighs. "At least maybe leave me my dignity?"

Even the distress still clouding her eyes isn't enough to stop the slow, impish smirk that appears on Connie's face. "Never."

Maine stands, once again faceless under the EVA helmet. "Ready."

"Good." Connie examines Maine for a moment, considering whether the logistics of corralling him the same way she did Wash are workable enough to try dealing with, then decides against it and tows Wash toward the door out of the locker room. "Let's go."

She lets go of Wash's arm as well so they can get through the doorway more easily, quickly pulling ahead when they reach the hallway. Wash lengthens his stride to catch up with her; she lets him, speaking without turning her head more than to indicate a general acknowledgement of his presence near her side. Maine, meanwhile, catches up easily. "Did you know Oregon very well?" Connie asks.

Wash shakes his head. "Not really. She kicked my ass in CQC training a few times. This was my first mission with her."

A short breath from Maine that sounds like a car engine turning over. Wash shoots him a glare over Connie's head. "No, listen, only time out of three missions is still my first with her, don't give me that."

Maine shrugs with a snort. Connie laughs slightly, gives Wash a sly glance. "He's just teasing."

"Yes, I know, that's my complaint."

Maine rumbles again and frees his arm from Connie's hold to reach across her and nudge Wash just enough to make him stumble. Wash squawks. "Hey, watch it!"

Connie covers her mouth to muffle real laughter, looking a little startled by it, then tugs Wash to a stop as they round a corner. "Here we are."

The sign beside the door says MEDICAL STORAGE. Someone has put a bright yellow smiley-face sticker under the sign, slightly off-center. Connie palms it open to reveal a room empty of medical supplies — unless one counts the varied bottles lining one of the steel shelves against the left wall as being of medical utility — but featuring a large round table in the center and a few extra chairs and a sideboard scattered at the edges of the room. Agents Florida and Wyoming are already present, Wyoming shuffling a deck of cards and both conversing in low voices. Wash looks between the table and the door. "Wait, how'd you get the table in here?"

"Shhh," says Connie quellingly, pulling him toward one of the seats at the table. "Don't worry about it."

"But—"

"Shh."

"Connie!" cries Florida. "I'm so glad you could join us. I brought your helmet — wouldn't want you to start at a disadvantage, after all!" He picks it up from the floor beside him and tosses it to her.

She catches it, gives him a warm, genuine smile, and sets it down on the table. "Thanks. But…I won't need it."

Wash puts his head down on his arms.

"Your call, of course," smiles Florida. "Oh, is Wash all right?"

Maine huffs as Connie says, straight-faced and sympathetic, "Oh, he will be. He just knows what he's getting into now." Wash groans without lifting his head.

Wyoming brays with laughter. "Oh, capital job, old sport! Really bringing it in today. Well done, that."

"Oooh, that's harsh." Florida pats the spot at the table next to him. "Come sit by me, Wash. I'll give you some pointers, eh? How about it?"

Wash lifts his rear and transfers it one seat to the left without lifting his head. Florida rubs his shoulder silently.

"Well, look at what the cat dragged in," says South from the doorway. Maine growls and she adds, "Yes, I'm talking about you, Maine. Are we even gonna have enough cards?"

"Actually, Wash invited me," Connie says primly. "And unless you two brought any other guests, we should, right, Reggie?"

"Absolutely, my dear."

"Oh, yeah." South gestures toward Wash. "What's with the new guy? Someone break the news?"

"Please remember me as I was," says Wash, voice muffled. "And not as I — actually, jesus, no, let Maine give my eulogy."

"That'll be some funeral," says Florida.

"It'll be all right, kid. Don't let them scare you." North lets the door hiss shut behind him and takes a seat beside Wyoming. "No, we're the last ones. Last I heard, Carolina has the training room for the next hour or so and Monty and Iowa are still in recovery. Looks like everyone else is out."

"Jolly good." Wyoming shuffles the deck once more, then taps it on the table to align the cards. "Five card stud, roll your own in turn, even straight and straight trump high. What?"

"Do you ever change, Reggie?" Connie asks.

"Absolutely not, my good lass. Why stray from what you're good at, after all?"

"No money," rumbles Maine.

Everyone except Wash turns to look at Maine. Then North says, "Oh, right. Still in the hole after last time, huh, buddy?"

A twitch ripples over Maine's frame like the skin of a horse trying to dislodge a horsefly. He looks away.

"Well, bollocks to that, then. What are we wagering?"

Connie puts her hand on top of the helmet sitting on the table beside her and smiles crookedly. "Well, I'm already playing with a handicap. Why don't we play strip poker?"

"Looks like South'll lose her shirt after all," says North carefully, stretching his legs out under the table.

South lets out an explosive " _ugh!_ "

"Um," says Washington, finally lifting his head and glancing at Florida for help. "I don't...actually know how to play five card stud."

"Are you kidding?" South laughs loudly. "Why'd you even _come_?"

"Really botched that choice, my lad."

"I know how to play poker!" Wash's voice is starting to pitch up desperately. "Just not...five card stud."

"Come on, you guys. We were all here once." Connie looks back to Wash. "What versions do you know?"

"Seven and five card draw, Texas hold 'em, miner's eight, California lowball, and six-card high-low split," he rattles off breathlessly, trying to salvage a fraction of his already meager reputation.

There's a pause, then Wyoming shuffles and aligns the deck again. "Well, I'm here to have a spot of fun, not to teach someone to play the game. How does five-card draw sound to all of you? Any objections?"

South, kicking her feet up onto the edge of the table so she can tip her seat back onto its two rear legs, sticks her thumb out and turns it downward with great exaggeration. "Booooriiiing."

"None, then. Very well. Betting rounds to fold, losing hands sacrifice a piece of clothing or armor. I deal, naturally."

"Welp," says North in quiet resignation.

"Now, now. Don't act like you didn't ask for this, old chap. Reap what you sow, and so on." Cards flit across the table as Wyoming deals with cardshark rapidity. He slaps the much-depleted deck at the center of the table once he's finished. "There we go. Everyone has their cards? Excellent. Start clockwise, I think."

Wash peeks at his hand and groans, resting his face on his palm.

"Oh god, Wash, really?" Connie doesn't bother to disguise the instinctive eyeroll.

"I said I knew how to play. I didn't say I was good at it."

"Suck it up, newbie." South drops her feet back onto the floor to gather and examine her hand. A second later she slides her entire hand over in a sloppy pile beside the deck and draws five new cards.

"South," sighs her brother.

"What?" she demands. "No one said anything about draw limits, so I'm drawing." She glances down at her new hand. "Fuck."

"You tried," says Connie, drawing two cards.

Maine draws three.

Wash stares at his hand for a few seconds, then separates three cards. A blue-gauntleted hand lands gently on his wrist and Florida shakes his head. Slowly Wash slides one card back into his hand and puts the other two in the slush pile. Agent Florida draws one for himself.

North examines his hand, flicking the cards thoughtfully. Wyoming harrumphs. "For someone so eager to give up his shirt not too long ago, you seem to be dilly-dallying quite a bit."

"Give me time, give me time. We've got all night." North contemplates his cards for a few more moments, then replaces three of them.

Wyoming snorts and draws two cards. "Fold or call."

South immediately tosses her cards into the middle of the table. With a regretful sigh, North follows suit. Wash, after a little while wavering, folds as well.

"Right, then. Everyone settled? Show your cards, in that case." The remaining players lay their cards face-up on the table. Wyoming immediately notices Florida's hand. "Blast. I wouldn't have thought it possible."

"Well, I guess I'm just lucky. You know the rules, though! I don't make them."

"Yes, yes, drat you." Wyoming triggers the release on his helmet and pulls it off, stowing it under his chair. Across the table, Maine and Connie are each pulling off a gauntlet.

Wyoming reshuffles with a fluttering snap of cards and deals again. This time, as South exchanges three cards and Connie examines the pile thoughtfully — chin resting on her hand, one finger curled against her lip — Florida suggests, "Well, since we're here to remember Oregon, why don't we all go around the table and say something about her?"

"If we're doing this, I need a drink," announces South, standing up and crossing to the shelf against the wall. She comes back with a bottle of tequila and a pair of shot glasses. She sets them down on the table, drops her helmet on the floor, fills both glasses, and knocks the first one back.

"Hey, little sister. Are you sure you can afford a handicap?"

"It's not a handicap, North. I'm just taking it off in advance so if I lose another hand I'm already prepared, and also, 'cause if I have to keep my mouth shut and stay sober while all of you take turns talking I'm going to kill myself." She knocks back the second shot.

"South." Connie puts her hand on South's forearm. "Slow down."

South glares at her for a moment, then pushes the bottle away a few inches. "There. Happy?"

"Happier." As Connie draws one card, she says, "Oregon was the first person to take me on in the training room when I joined alpha team. She beat me in everything except close-quarters with weapons, then gave me a concussion. I tried to throw her and the next thing I knew, she'd landed behind me and then I was on the floor, wondering why I couldn't move my body. And then, a few days later, she sent me a set of throwing knives. She left them in front of my room and I found them when I came back."

Maine studies his cards. Eventually, he draws three again. Eventually, he says, "Had my back."

Washington tosses a single card into the pile, but hesitates before drawing another. "I don't know if I know enough to say anything about her."

"Just try your best," says Florida gently.

Wash slowly draws a card and slides it into his hand before responding. "She...wiped the training room floor with me in every session we had together and I didn't even get knives out of it?" He looks around at the table and wilts slightly. "Uh. No? Look, I did say I didn't have anything."

Connie gives him a small smile. "You can have some of mine."

"Oh." He brings a hand to his helmet, as if scratching his head. North chuckles. "Uh, thanks."

"Don't mention it," she says seriously, one corner of her mouth dimpling slightly.

"I always thought she was a good kid." Florida exchanges three cards and leans back, drumming his fingers on the hand laid facedown on the table. "Sure, she was hard on people, but she always gave her honest opinion and advice and I really took it to heart."

"Kid." North laughs, once, toying with his hand. "How old _are_ you, Florida?"

"Now, North, you know what I always say about age. It's not the number of years you have on you, but what you've got inside that counts. And Oregon, well, she had a lot inside that I think all of us would envy."

"Like a bullet," murmurs Wyoming.

"Well, I doubt any of us envy that, but you are factually correct, Reggie, and all of us appreciate your contribution."

"I guess that's the best I'm going to get," North says ruefully, switching out two cards. "I'll find out one day, you know."

South plants her hands on the table and leans over it, staring hard at Florida. "Hey, Florida. I'm curious. What advice did she give you?"

"Oh, let me think. Well, over the course of a few occasions where we talked, she informed me that I had a really offputting way of acting, that I shouldn't lurk around so much if I didn't want people to be — oh, fiddlesticks, what was the phrase she used? — that's right, skeeved out by me. And she suggested that I should show some emotion once in a while. I didn't quite understand that one — I think, you know, that I'm very open about my emotions, and I do try my best to make a practice of it — but I did start looking more closely for opportunities to really let it out."

South lowers her head to laugh and pushes herself back into her chair. "Right. That's what I thought."

North looks down at his hand for a while. When he speaks, it's with a brittle tension whose undercurrent has been carefully missing from his voice all evening. "She pulled my and South's asses out of the fire more times than I can count. I think that goes the same for everyone here. She'd taken bullets for me more than once, and...well, I guess today was the last one."

"There, there, old chap. She was probably dead before it hit her, in any case."

North turns in his chair to give Wyoming a hard look-over. "You're a real goddamn ray of sunshine, you know that?"

He snorts. "If it makes you feel any better, she didn't like me much. Left me to get run over by a Warthog once."

"We know," says Connie.

"Well, there you go. Don't have much else to add, I'm afraid." Wyoming resumes rotating the cards in his hand, tapping them against the tabletop at each ninety-degree turn to realign them into a neat stack. He looks up at the expectant silence that follows his statement. "What? I already drew while North was going on. Think you chappies'd pay attention to a thing like that."

"Fine." South slaps down two cards and takes a new pair. She looks up at the group, then looks away. "I liked her, okay? I don't want to talk about it." Her tone is intensely bitter.

"South..."

"Fuck off, North."

After a second's hesitation, North turns back to resettle himself in his seat and puts his cards down.

"Well, fold or call, let's go," chivvies Wyoming. He looks around the table to see Connie and Florida fold, eyes up the players remaining with a "hmmm," and spreads his cards face up on the table.

"Goddammit," snaps South, throwing her cards to the center. Maine slumps and shakes his head hard, shoving his cards away without looking.

Washington slaps his cards down in grim triumph. Wyoming squints at them. "Oh, bollocks."

North flips over the cards in his hand.

"Oh, _what_?!" Wash explodes at the four of a kind to his own spade flush.

"Sorry, kid," North shrugs, the brittleness in his voice from earlier replaced once again with calm.

Agent Florida squeezes Wash's shoulder as the new kid drops his head and presses the release trigger on his gauntlet. "Bullshit," he mutters under his breath.

"There, there. It was a good hand, Wash, and under — well, not any, but most circumstances, you'd have come out on top."

Wash drops his head onto the table. "Thanks."

A card hits his helmet.

"What."

"New round, kiddo," says North, gathering his new hand.

"Oh."

This time, as they go around the table, South says, "You know what _really_ pisses me off? I was _right fucking there_. I was about two seconds from landing on the piece of garbage that was going to put a bullet in North when she decided, oh, great idea, I should catch it instead!" She almost throws her cards across the table, but stops herself and clenches her fist instead, making the material of her undersuit creak. "Fuck."

Wash hesitates, then ventures, "There was nothing else you could've done, South. You did everything you could."

"I _know_ ," she snarls. "Why the _hell_ do you think I'm so angry?"

Wash looks down at the table, starts to go for one of the cards in his hand, then unfans them and places them facedown. Florida pats the back of his hand and takes his own turn.

"Jolly good," says Wyoming, tossing two cards into the slush pile. "Fold or call."

This time, both North and Maine have three of a kind — both four of diamonds.

North squints down at his cards. "Well, that's not right."

"North..." Connie sighs.

"Hey, don't look at me. I've had my hands above the table the entire time. Someone else is messing around."

"Well, someone else can stop." She taps the tabletop and turns her palm upward. "Give them here."

"To you?" Wyoming snorts through his moustache. "Yes, let's all hand over the game, I'm sure it can't become any more of a farce than it already is."

She turns to arch an eyebrow at him as Maine slides his hand over to hers. "Unlike some people here, I don't need to cheat to come out on top."

"She's got a point there," says Florida, sounding pleased just to be present for the discussion. Wyoming snorts again and crosses his arms in continued passive disapproval. Connie, meanwhile, takes two of the fours from Maine's hand and sticks them in her utility pouch, tossing the last one into the middle with the burned cards. North gathers his cards and adds them to Maine's.

"Well, I'm not afraid to admit I'm not sure how we're supposed to judge that one," continues Florida. "Dead round?"

"Next highest hand, I think," says Wyoming. "Which would be...good lord, it's South."

"Finally some decent news." South flips her hair out of her eyes, leans back, and crosses her arms. Her hair immediately begins sliding back over her face. "Strip."

"Whoa," says York. "Should I come back later, or…?"

South immediately turns around in her chair, her expression one of unholy vengeful schadenfreude. "Weren't you going to be at the other end of the ship? What happened, York? Get a little lonely and decide you just had to see us?"

York does something, this sort of subtle quiet whole-body flinch that he doesn't seem to be entirely aware of, and says, "'Lina was, uh, in sort of a bad mood. Figured it was best not to hang around."

"Did she tell you to take your balls and eat them on a plate with a fine hollandaise sauce and a sprinkling of cilantro, you half-baked graham-cracker motherfucker?" South asks with genial calmness.

"Uh, no. She did that kind of ignore-y not-talky thing and then didn't quite kick me in the head."

"Was she that upset?" asks Connie unhappily.

"Well, it was more like I might've gotten in front of her target a few times." He looks around the room, gestures to South. "Has she been drinking? She sounds like she's been drinking."

"Yes," says North at the same time that Connie nods.

"Oh." York scratches the back of his head. "Mind if I join in?"

"Please help me," begs Washington.

"He could use it," agrees North.

"I think that's a fantastic idea," says Florida, rising before York can start looking around for a chair. "You can take my place."

Wash does a panicked double-take. "What? Don't leave me!"

"Sorry, kiddo." Florida pats Wash's back as he steps away from his seat. "I said a few hands, and a few hands it has been. You try not to get into too much trouble, now."

Wash puts his head in his hands. "I'm doomed."

South cackles gleefully. "Yep."

"Yep," agrees North.

"Well, it's a good thing I'll be drinking, then." York stops at the liquor shelf on his way to Florida's chair and picks up a pair of beer bottles that he sets on the table before sitting down. "Probably need it to survive this."

"You know, I think I will too. Pardon me for saying, but this game seems a little something of a train wreck." Wyoming gets up and heads to the shelf in York's wake, stopping in front of it to peruse it for a few moments. "We don't have a single bloody snifter on the ship, do we?"

Glances are exchanged around the table. Connie shrugs.

"And not a splash of brandy, either, I've no doubt." He lifts a bottle, squints at it. "This is the freshest scotch I've ever had the displeasure of seeing. Did someone have to be paid to take this onboard?" Connie muffles an involuntary giggle. "Damn it all. It'll have to do, I suppose." He returns with the bottle and a glass, pours one into the other, and regards the contents with a glare of displeasure. He takes a sip and glares at the glass again. "Awful. Simply appalling."

"See, Reggie?" North cocks his head, clapping him on the back. "Knew you had it in you to grieve after all."

Wyoming turns the same stink-eye with which he was regarding the glass onto North, then returns it to its original target. He takes another sip and puts the glass down. "Unbelievable. Well, let's get this show on the road. Goodness knows I'll need something to distract from this swill." Connie is by now doubled over laughing so hard it comes out only as sobbing breaths. Maine glances down at her before his attention is arrested by the card that hits his wrist.

York looks down at the five facedown cards in front of him. "Wait a minute. This isn't stud."

North, cards already in hand, says, "Oh, right. We're playing five card draw this time, York. Think you'll be able to keep up?"

York continues to stare at his cards, then shakes his head and looks around the table. "What the hell did I _miss_?"

Connie winds down into gasping enough that she can finally straighten up, grabbing the edge of the table to support herself and wiping her eyes. Wash moves his head as if to say something, but doesn't.

South looks up from stacking the two shot glasses on top of each other and smirks. "New guy didn't know how to play. Sad, huh?"

York shakes his head again and gathers his cards slowly. "Jesus." To Wash, he adds, "You're disrupting the way of life on this ship, you know that?"

"It's not like I meant to," he points out, as if this is a valid defense.

York laughs and shakes Wash's shoulder gently. "Man, don't be sorry. You probably just leveled the playing field for half the people here."

"Oh." Wash gathers his hand slowly as he compensates for the reversal in the conversation.  "Uh. Cool?"

York leans back in his chair and rests an ankle on the opposite knee. "Yeah. Cool."

Four rounds of play later, there are a lot more glasses on the table and York has been divested of half his armor, including his chestplate, which was taken as penalty for, South says, "the worst pun ever, in all of history."

"I don't think it was that bad," he complains as South picks up his chestplate from the table and dumps it on the floor behind her.

"It was," she says.

"It was," North agrees. Alone of the group, he has yet to give up a single piece of armor. Maine rumbles consensus with the twins.

York looks down at his stunningly bad hand. "Y'know, this wasn't really what I meant by leveling the playing field. I don't know the odds here, but I'm pretty sure I'm luckier than this."

"Face it, York," says Connie. Next to North and Wyoming, she's still the most clothed at the table, missing only her helmet and gauntlets. "You're just bad at poker."

"I dunno, that doesn't fit too well with my devil-may-care personality. Maybe I'm just the only one here who knows how to play and you're all playing a different game."

"That's a good point, York." North rotates his winning ace on its corner. "Maybe the reason you're doing so badly's that you're still playing five card stud."

"And even in five card stud, you suck," adds South with an unpleasant laugh.

"Yeah, that reminds me, South. How come you're three shots in and beating York's hand every round, and he's still mostly sober?"

She flashes a dark grin. "'Cause I get better when I'm drunk, North."

"Or you're palming cards."

"Maybe I am," she says mockingly, stealing Wyoming's drink and tipping it back with blithe disregard for his moustached glare.

"This is collusion," protests York. He appeals to the rest of the table. "They're ganging up on me."

Maine stands with a huff to pace the edge of the room, ending with the flat of his fist resting against the wall beside his forehead. Both his gauntlets and thigh-guards are gone, piled on the floor beside all of Wash's upper-body armor except his chestplate and helmet. Wash himself is looking far less sure of his future.

"And another thing." York drops his previous point to point an accusatory finger at Maine. "No one with a poker face like his should be that bad at this game. Like, I'd get it if it was Wash—"

"Thanks," says Wash.

"—but you've gotta have some serious people-skills handicaps to be a terrifying unreadable son of a bitch and still fall through on every single round, man."

Maine hits the wall with his fist and turns to glare at York.

"Anyway, that's all I had to say," says York.

"Feel better?" asks North with a low chuckle.

"Yeah, man, I do. I really do. Thanks for letting me get that off my chest. It just...felt really good to open up there for a minute, y'know?"

"Please, let's not have a wedding and a funeral on the same night," says Wyoming, eyeing the cards still in York's hand. "The mood whiplash might provide us with far too many casualties to conveniently explain away."

"Yeah. You're right." York aligns his cards against the table before passing them over. "We should make sure to spread 'em out a little or the boss might get suspicious." His tone is impeccably casual. Outside of his peripheral vision, Connie folds her hands in her lap.

Wyoming hums an aimless little tune to himself instead of replying.

North catches his first card and examines it as if searching for a watermark. "So did anyone know Oregon's real name? I never found out."

Glances are exchanged around the table before Connie says, "Melody."

"That's a nice name," comments Wash.

"And she couldn't hold a tune to save her goddamn life." South's hand is mostly steady as she pours another shot, though the mouth of the bottle hits the edge of the glass hard. "How's that for irony, right?" She slaps down a card, sending the top few cards in the draw pile tumbling in the resulting draft.

Wyoming's brow knits. "Well, now, you needn't ruin it for everyone else, you know."

"Hey, Wyoming. Remember that thing I said about not using lube? That's still on the table."

"Hah! My good woman, I welcome the challenge. Though I doubt I could ever match your illustrious record—"

York nabs the draw pile and surrounding cards, shuffles them together, and drops them back into the middle of the table. "There, problem solved. Any complaints from the peanut gallery?"

Wyoming snorts and crosses his arms. South responds, "Yeah, I've got one. You shuffle like you pick locks."

York gives her a lopsided half-grin. "Better than anyone you know? Hey, Wyoming, I think I just took over your spot."

She hacks out a laugh and settles back in her chair, separating her cards one by one with her index finger before pushing them back in with the rest again. "Yeah. Right. Sure."

This time, North and Wyoming fold to what turns out to be a high jack in Connie's hand after a minute-long staredown.

"You're some kind of diabolical genius, you know that?" North asks, not without admiration.

Wyoming harrumphs impressively, moustache vibrating. "Diabolical being the key word, yes."

Connie shakes her head as she adds the burned cards to her own and cuts the deck. North tosses his hand over to her to shuffle into it. "I just have a good poker face," she says. "I'm surprised at you, though, North. I think this might be the best you've ever played."

He laughs softly, exchanging glances with South, who looks away. "Well, it's no big secret. South and I grew up on five card draw, actually. She started using it to swindle the richer kids in middle school, and I joined in to help her out. It was a pretty good grift — got us our first bike."

Connie raises her eyebrows, drawing a four of diamonds from the deck in her hands.

North's grin is audible. "And my first broken cheekbone, just before South knocked the guy's teeth out."

"Cheating penalty, one piece of armor," Wash says with surprising quickness. At everyone's looks, he adds, "It was a house rule in my old unit. Look, I'm just trying to contribute."

"I'm with Wash," York says. "If I had to give up armor for a pun—"

"A _really_ bad pun—"

"—then it's only fair that cheaters do, too. Right, Wash?"

"Well, okay, it _was_ a really bad pun," Wash disclaims.

"This is the bullshit I have to work with," York announces to Maine and Connie.

South drops her elbows on the table, showing her empty hands once everyone turns to look. "Prove I cheated, then I'll take it off." After a beat she continues, "You can't, can you?" She kicks back into her chair. "That's what I thought."

Maine's chair scrapes backwards and he stands with a low growl to walk around the table toward South. She nearly falls out of her seat scrambling to get away and press the release on one of her greaves. She pulls it off and throws it to the floor. "Fine, fine! Jesus, you gigantic goddamn psychopath." Maine makes another inarticulate, slightly resentful sound best transcribed as 'hrmf' before returning to his place with an air of finality. "Fuck. I need another drink."

"Hard luck," Wyoming says into his glass, then immediately flinches at the bone-cracking kick that collides with his ankle under the table.

North detaches his utility kit and holds it up for everyone to see. "How's this?"

York shakes his head. "I always forget how much of a complete bastard you can be."

"Huh." North turns to Connie. "So, queen of the cards, am I all accounted for?"

She trains a thoughtful gaze on him until he begins to lower the kit uncertainly. "Uh."

Finally her lip twitches and she nods. "I guess it'll do." He tosses the kit to her and she catches it left-handed, clipping it opposite of her own.

"And see, now, I'm not sure how I should feel about that," continues York, irrepressibly. "That seems like, I dunno, also cheating?"

Connie treats him to a hooded stare. "York."

"Yeah?"

"Do you really think you'll get me out of my armor before you're out of yours, regardless?"

York opens his mouth, closes it, aims a single-barreled finger at her. "Conceded."

"You're sweet." She tosses the deck to Wyoming, who catches about half of it while the rest of the cards land scattered on the table. "Deal us, dealer."

"I've no idea why I bother playing with all of you apes," Wyoming informs the table even as he deftly regathers and neatens the cards. "Frankly, it's a mockery of the game that no decent person would stand for."

North flicks a nearby card across to him. "'Cause we're the best you can get, Reg. Anyway, who says any of us are really all that decent?"

"Yes, well, that notwithstanding, it's my belief that we all deserve better. Myself in particular, of course."

York looks up past South and Wyoming to the door behind them and uncrosses his legs to put both feet square on the ground. "Oh."

Carolina, red hair dark and slicked to her forehead with dampness, stands in the doorway. The splinted right wrist that kept her out of today's mission is folded awkwardly over her other arm. She's wearing only leggings, a tank top, and sneakers, but they're all clean and except for her hair the rest of her is dry — straight from the showers, most likely. "Can we talk?"

"Yeah. Uh, hold on." York gets up. "Keep my seat warm for me, guys."

Carolina waits for him to exit before letting the door close behind her, looking into the room over her shoulder as it does.

"Trouble in paradise?" murmurs South.

"I think we reached that stage when she almost kicked him in the head," Wash says.

Wyoming turns around in his chair and stares at the door, combing his fingers over his moustache in calculation, then stands and pads silently over to press his ear against the wall beside it.

"Well?" whispers Connie after a minute.

Wyoming raises an index finger for silence. A few seconds later, he whispers back, "Talking about last month. The manufacturing facility."

"Really digging up old graves, huh?" South spins a shot glass around her finger on the tabletop, grabbing it when it makes a noise.

Wyoming shakes his head and leans in to listen again.

He steps away just before the door opens a few minutes later, heading to the liquor shelf as York and Carolina come back in. Connie gets up to help him. Carolina takes up a position against the wall, one foot propped up behind her, as York returns to his spot. "Go ahead and keep playing, you guys," she tells the other freelancers. "I'm good to watch." Her gaze drifts around the room for a moment before settling on a blank point on the opposite wall — nothing in particular.

"Huh," Wash says under his breath.

"Good talk?" asks North.

Carolina shifts her shoulders against the wall to settle more comfortably. "Something like that."

"Just choose something, Reggie," Connie says.

"Asking me to choose between rubbing alcohol and moonshine is asking me to pick a side in a Faustian dilemma, my dear," he insists. "Try as I might, I can't quite manage to reconcile my desire to get absolutely zozzled with the consequences of drinking rubbing alcohol or moonshine. Namely, having to drink rubbing alcohol or moonshine."

She lifts one of the bottles from the shelf and places it in his hands. "Try the rubbing alcohol."

"Hm." He unscrews the cap and sniffs at the bottle's contents, nose wrinkling immediately. "Yes, a fine vintage, straight from the home first aid kit. Should go well with a fish fork directly to the eye." He takes a cautious sip, then turns around to look at the rest of the group. "Well, I don't know what all you blokes are looking at."

"Ever considered charging people to watch you drink, Wyoming?" York asks. "You'd make a killing on the comedy circuit."

"Normally I'd demand to be paid before staying in the same room as this...material," he frowns. "Morituri te salutant, I suppose. Might as well get on with it." He tips the bottle back again and coughs once before taking it back to his seat with him. "And now I've already forgotten why I wanted to drink this in the first place. Brilliant. Where were we?"

"Dealing," says North.

"Ah. Wonderful. Tally ho, eh? If we're lucky we'll see that lovely mug of yours soon enough."

North chuckles. By now, in this room, it's an ominous sound.

Connie comes back with a beer of her own, matching the set of bottles York is idly swapping around each other in front of himself, shell-game style. Wash says, "Didn't know you drank."

"I don't usually." She carefully turns the bottle upside down and balances it on her fingers above the table before letting it tip down again and catching it with her other hand. She puts it down and pries the cap off. "I don't like the taste much, you know? Actually, it reminds me of this one terrible soda brand back home with a similar flavor...not something I'm too nostalgic for, to be honest." She flicks the cap across the table to him and he catches it under his palm without thinking. "Really, I just figure all of you could use the advantage."

"That's...true. But do you have to say it so bluntly?"

"Bluntly's 'you suck,'" says South, who after quite a few drinks is drooping noticeably. She lifts her head again and tries to shake her hair out of her face. It's even less effective than before, when she could still manage the sharp movement necessary to flip it away.

Carolina shifts against the wall behind her, switching feet. "How do you see?"

"That is a mystery we have never been able to figure out," North replies.

South tries to cartwheel one of her cards into the middle of the table and fails miserably. "Bitch vision. I have the amazing ability to see bitches through any barrier. So basically like normal vision around here."

"You're charming when you're drunk," Carolina says.

"Thanks. Wanna have sex later?"

"No. Thanks."

Wash looks between South and Carolina for a moment and signs something to Maine under the table. Maine shakes his head slightly, then nods toward the cards in the middle of the table. The gestures do not escape South. "Hey, Wash. New kid. Something you wanna say?"

Wash's helmet flicks in her direction guiltily. "Uh. No. That's okay, actually. I'm good."

"Come _oooon_." She draws the word out sarcastically. "Scared to share with the whole class?"

"South," North warns.

"It's really nothing," Wash says.

She slams her hands on the table. "Spill it, newbie!"

" _South!_ " Carolina snaps. Maine and North both begin to stand at almost the same time. North shakes his head at him, then passes behind Wyoming to take South's shoulder.

"We're going."

South knocks his hand away. "Get off."

He catches her arm before she finishes the sentence; she tries to break his grip and he gets his thumb between the tendons of her other wrist as it lands on his, making her wince visibly. "No. Now, South, or I'll carry you out."

She glares at him, teeth bared, for a few moments more before letting go of his wrist. He releases hers and marches her out of the room with his other hand on her collar. The door hisses shut behind them. In the sudden silence of the room, York lets out a low whistle. Wash slumps.

"For getting hands like yours, you really have the worst goddamn luck in the squad, don't you, Wash?" York says.

"All of that was on South," replies Carolina, staring hard at the door. Maine mirrors Carolina's pose, flexing his empty hands and growling in a continuous low rumble like the early foreshocks to an earthquake. "She...has a few issues to work out."

"More like fight out," murmurs Connie, just loudly enough to be heard.

"Keep those comments to yourself, Connie."

Connie sinks lower in her chair. "Yes, sir." Her eyes catch Wyoming's and he meets her gaze steadily.

"Is she going to be all right?" asks Wash.

"Is she ever?" replies York.

"You too, York. Can it. Wash, she'll be fine. If she isn't, I'll have a talk with her later. Maine, sit down. It's fine."

He does, but slowly, still growling at a lower intensity. "Won't stay quiet."

"I know. We'll deal with her when it happens."

Wash glances around at the group, a little tentatively. "So, uh...her and Oregon...?"

"Yep," says York.

"Yeah," says Connie.

"A match made somewhere in the region of purgatory, at the highest," says Wyoming.

Wash shakes his head. "I don't blame her for being upset. I would be."

"Upset's one thing," says Carolina. "Taking it out on a rookie's going too far. You deserve better than that, Wash." Wash looks down at his hands.

"Well, time to move on to pretending that didn't happen, I guess," says York. "Whose turn is it?"

"Maine's," says Connie. He dutifully swaps out a pair of cards. Wash follows up with another pair.

York is resignedly pulling off his codpiece a minute and a half later when Wash says, "So, South and Oregon...what was that like?"

York tosses the codpiece into the increasingly impressive collection of armor scattered on the floor behind him. "Y'know that movie where a pair of mercs try to infiltrate a college and end up bringing down the whole paramilitary cabal behind it instead?"

"Third Degree? Wasn't the cabal the bad guys?"

"That's not the point. My point is, remember the part where everything's on fire? They were like that."

"Oh. Wow."

"Yeah."

"That's...horrifying."

"Uh huh."

"They weren't that bad," says Carolina.

Connie tilts her head at her. " _You_ didn't piss Oregon off during lockdown paint training and get hit by her and South at the same time." Carolina shrugs.

"I'm—" Wash swallows whatever he was about to say and suddenly becomes very busy swapping out cards.

"They poisoned my coffee once," York informs Wash. "I had the shits for the next day and a half. I had to get an IV in." Wyoming suddenly becomes very interested in his dealing.

"York," Wash says seriously, "I get seniority and all, but please don't tell me about the condition of your ass. Like, ever."

"Hey, I'm just sayin'. They were _seriously_ into revenge."

"Are you sure that wasn't just your sleep-dep caffeine binge?" asks Carolina.

"What was it revenge for?" Wash sounds fascinated.

"Look, why should it be revenge for anything? Why do you just automatically assume—"

"He walked in on them," says Connie.

Wash considers that for a moment. "Huh."

Carolina raises an eyebrow. "I was there for York's bathroom adventures—"

" _Please_ don't call them that," says Wash.

"—but I didn't know about the reason."

Connie looks down at her hand serenely. "I have my ways of finding things out." She lays her cards on the table, revealing a queen-high even spread.

Wash heaves a resigned sigh and pushes his cards toward the center. "So that's what the thing with the even straights is about."

"Mm," Connie says absently, not bothering to watch him strip, looking thoughtfully in the direction of the door instead. Standing, she says, "I'm just going to...check on South for a little while."

"Bye?" Wash says too late, boot in hand, as the door slides closed behind her.

She returns a round later as Wyoming and York are pulling off a piece of leg armor each in the face of Maine's first winning hand, slipping back into the seat beside him before he even hears her. "Good visit?" Wash asks.

"Something like that," she says neutrally, picking up her beer again to watch the two losers bicker as if she'd never left at all.

It's a little under half an hour before the door opens again, this time on Maine steadfastly refusing to take his helmet off.

"Come on, you enormous baby," Wash argues. "I took mine off." His hair is tousled and sticking in improbable directions from its time inside his helmet. Maine shakes his head adamantly and crosses his arms tighter. "You're the one who wanted to play! What did you think would happen?"

"No."

"This is not the time for the one-word answer!"

" _No_."

"Are we interrupting?" asks North, sounding amused. South is standing slightly behind him, looking sullen and resentful but no longer ready to explode. There's a new spiderweb crack in the center of North's chestplate, small but noticeable.

Carolina tries and fails to keep from smiling, her lips twitching with the effort. "No, you came at just the right time. Come on in."

"Look, if you're not going to take the helmet off, it's the undersuit and I'm pretty sure neither of us wants to go there," says Wash.

"I can see that," North replies to Carolina. Wyoming scoots aside as he pulls his chair back to the table and resumes his previous position. "South...?"

She curls into her seat with a scowl. "Hey, newbie. Sorry you're a complete social failure."

" _South_."

" _Fine_. Sorry I overreacted at you. Better?"

"It's fine," says Wash. "Really."

"See? He said it's fine."

North looks Wash over, apparently determining that he's unscarred by the experience. "Yeah. Guess it's fine."

"Good to see we're all one big happy family again," says York. At this point he's in nothing but his boxers and looking fairly copacetic with the situation.

"Well, that's a novel description," replies Wyoming, still missing, barring one boot, only the armor above his waist but by now looking slightly blurred. Somehow, his accent has become even more British in the intervening period.

Maine finally pulls his helmet off and Wash snatches it away and tosses it to York before he can change his mind. York tosses it farther away into the corner of the room, where it rolls gently until it bumps against the unexplained sideboard. Maine hunches with a disgruntled sound.

"You know we're still gonna be able to see you, right?" says Wash. "You're pretty much too big to miss."

"Shut up."

"Sounds like a family to me," says North contentedly. Wyoming, it seems, has begun entertaining himself by doing trick throws as he deals. North catches a card that goes spinning above his head with its back still to the rest of the table.

Wash and Maine both fold for the next three rounds. York loses on a low two pair to Wyoming's high in the third. He removes the boxers with uncanny cheerfulness.

"God fuckin' damn, don't sit right on the chair," protests South.

York waggles his hips, prompting outbursts of laughter from Carolina and Connie. "Why not? I only showered a couple hours ago. I shower _very_ thoroughly."

"That's disgusting and you're disgusting."

"I'm not disgusting. Wash, you don't think I'm disgusting, do you?"

"How thoroughly are we talking here?" Wash asks.

" _Quite thoroughly indeed_."

"I...don't think I'm qualified to say how disgusting that is."

"I'm hurt. All of you, hurt." With great theatricality, York lays his boxers on the seat of the chair. "There. Is that to the satisfaction of all parties?"

"What I want to know is how you ended up naked before Wash and Maine," says North as York seats himself.

"It's because these two are cowards," announces York. "Lily-livered pusillanimites. They keep folding like no tomorrow."

"It's called strategy," insists Wash.

"Strategy involves actually winning, kid. You had evens just now. You coulda rocked it."

"How did you—"

"More importantly, if you've been looking at other people's hands, how are you naked right now?" asks Connie.

"You know," replies York, "when I figure out an excuse for that, I'll get back to you."

"He psyched me out," Wash mutters. As York intercepts the card aimed at North, he adds, "Wait, are you still playing?"

"Hey, not once in my life have I gotten naked _not_   to do something fun."

"Uh...the medical exams...?"

"With some exceptions."

"What are you betting?" asks North, head resting in his hand, probably smiling.

"Hmm. Sexual favors? No — regular favors?" York nods decisively. "Yeah, regular favors."

Wyoming begins, "I can probably supply you with a joke for that—"

" _No_ ," say several people simultaneously.

"You'd like it," he persists.

"Reggie," Connie says kindly, " _no_ one likes your jokes."

"Well, you don't have to be so impertinent about it. A simple no would suffice."

"Yeah," says North. "You're right. I dunno why none of us thought of that."

Wash manages to hold out for two more rounds before calling against South with three queens. Smirking, one card by one, she lays out a full house.

"What," he says flatly.

"Take. It. Off," she replies in a slow singsong.

"The odds on that were nearly seven hundred to one."

"Yep."

"You definitely cheated."

She takes one of Wyoming's jacks and uses it to brush her hair out of her eyes ostentatiously. "Gonna strip search me to prove it?"

Wash falters. "Uh..."

"New rule," South announces, tossing the card into the air and clipping it across the table when she tries to catch it.

"Nice one," says Connie.

South ignores her. "You wanna accuse someone of cheating? You gotta prove how they did it."

It's obvious now why Wash was so reluctant to remove his helmet — his poker face is utterly nonexistent. He flushes and grits his teeth. "You know I can't do that."

"Awww, too bad for you, then." She steals another of Wyoming's cards too quickly for his grab for it to make contact. His hand smacks against the table loudly.

"C'mon," Wash says desperately, looking around at the rest of the group for support.

Carolina, having enlisted a chair to straddle backwards with her chin resting on her crossed arms, lifts her head so she can shrug. "It seems fair. With this kind of game, allegations of cheating are an expected part of the gameplay. Sorry, Wash."

Wash bites his lip, running his hand through his hair before finding the release. "Shit."

He peels off his undersuit slowly, prompting a wolf whistle from York along with a comment about twenty-dollar bills and their place relevant to this situation. When he pulls the suit down over his hips, Connie clamps a hand over her mouth. South and Wyoming start laughing uncontrollably.

"It's part of a fully-sealed life-support system! They're meant to be worn commando!" Wash's face is fry-an-egg red.

"Yeah," York says between snickers, "but no one actually _does_."

Wash shoves the rest of the suit down his legs and yanks it off each foot. "Fuck you guys."

North points out mildly, "York's the only one who's all the way undressed yet..."

" _Especially_ you."

"Oh my god, Wash," Connie gasps, laughing so hard she's begun to hiccup. She manages, with effort, to get the laughter — if not the hiccups — under control enough to speak. "It's going to be okay, I—" She lapses into silence, too breathless from laughing to make any sound but the occasional hiccup.

Wash hunches in on himself in his chair in an attempt to cover up. "Right, so am I done now? Can I go?"

"Now?" demands Wyoming in full Imperial bombast. "When the fun is only just beginning?"

"It'll be okay," Connie repeats, finally winding down enough that she's able to giggle audibly. Beside her, South is almost as red-faced as Washington, forehead on the table as she laughs so hard she can no longer hold herself up. "God, Wash, listen — stay and keep playing, you can bet with my armor. I'm pretty tired of being clothed anyway." South lifts her head up in an attempt to wiggle her eyebrows that fails spectacularly and starts her on another laughing jag. Her head thumps back onto the tabletop.

Wash brings his shoulders up higher around his ears. "Thanks for the vote of confidence."

Connie purses her lips, trying and failing to bring her smile into at least a less face-hurting configuration. "You're welcome," she says, high-pitched and breathless.

Carolina stands, trying to control the grin that keeps twitching its way onto her face. "I think I'm going to have something to drink, too."

"Hey, Carolina," York calls.

"Hm?"

The three beers in him probably help with the lopsided grin he's aiming at her but aren't enough to take off the slight nervous edge on it. "Y'know, I'm naked too."

"No."

He shrugs, doing his best to play it off. "Worth a try."

Four more rounds, three of which end with Wyoming or North bluffing out the table on what turns out to be a high card or a low pair, and Maine lays down a king-high two pair against Connie's straight flush. His only visible reaction is the noticeable tightening of the muscles in his jaw (teeth gritted behind lips) and a faint darkening of the skin of his face that might be the precursor to a blush as he looks down at the cards on the table. It's a good thirty seconds before he stands and begins to pull off his undersuit without a word. As it turns out, he wears it the same way as Wash.

"I just want to mention for the record how privileged I feel to be here tonight," says North.

"Mhm," South agrees, face tilted toward Maine's junk, sounding preoccupied.

York shakes his head, not breaking his line of sight. "I always see it when this sort of thing happens, but I never quite believe it."

"Stop sexually harassing the man who can crush your skull in one hand," says Carolina.

"No, no," says Wyoming. "I'm curious how this will play out."

"Hasn't crushed my skull yet," says South. "I'm willing to risk it."

"Please stop staring at my friend's dick," says Washington, hunched as low as physically possible without his nose touching the table. With even less body fat over the lean muscle wrapping his body than York has, his skin is beginning to goosebump. "It's making me very vicariously uncomfortable."

"Well, it's not like _you're_ giving us much of a show, so I gotta appreciate _someone_ —"

"That's enough," Carolina declares as Maine sits again, glowering at the universe in general and definitely starting to look pink-tinged.

" _Fiiiiine_." South flips her hair badly and turns in her seat. "I'll appreciate Connie instead. How's that?"

Connie, now missing a thigh guard as well, raises her beer in a toast and then immediately ruins it by snorting with laughter as soon as she takes a sip.

"Yes, I can see that's going very well," Carolina comments dryly.

"This is what you get, motherfucker," a naked Wash informs Maine. "These are the wages of your sin."

A small twitch at the corner of his mouth breaks Maine's expression of cosmic embarrassment for a second as, looking nowhere but the cards Wyoming is now cutting, he says, "Worth it."

Later:

Wyoming, fidgeting with his cards by lifting them an inch or so and letting them fall to the table again in a neat stack between his fingers, says, "York. Knock knock, mate."

York sighs. "Who's there, Wyoming?"

"Call."

"Wait, what?"

"Call who," Wyoming persists.

"What? Are you calling my hand or what? You gotta be clear, man."

"Knock knock."

With an explosive sigh, York spreads his hand face-up on the table.

"Oh, jolly good. I win again," Wyoming says, moustache rising with his moderately inebriated smirk of satisfaction.

"That is some serious next-level mindfuckery," North observes with admiration.

"That is _such bullshit_ ," Wash observes as South finishes pulling her undersuit off to reveal a by now quite wrinkled t-shirt and leggings. The t-shirt features a silkscreened graphic that states TESTICULAR GENOCIDE, which is probably either a band or a declaration of general intent.

"I'm playing strip poker, dumbass, you think I wouldn't come prup– fuck." South rolls her eyes at the ceiling and moves her jaw around, loosening up her mouth, before tipping her head back down and addressing Wash again. "Prepared. You think I wouldn't come prepi– _jesus christ goddamn_."

"Give up," suggests Connie cheerfully.

"Say 'pepperoni,'" suggests York.

"Panoply," adds Carolina.

"You didn't even know we were going to be playing strip poker," he says, blatantly doing his best to keep his voice controlled and even. "It wasn't decided until after everyone arrived."

South smirks at him, eyes half-lidded, crossing her arms over her chest, and he hesitates. "...Did you?" he asks uncertainly.

"She always does this," says North. "Literally. Every time."

South ignores him, maintaining eye contact with Washington as she blows her bangs out of her eyes. "Maybe I did, maybe I didn't. But what's poker without a shirt to lose, right?"

"Bridge?" says York.

" _Every time_ ," North repeats unregarded.

South laughs, loudly and with little mirth. Wyoming winces at the sound and leans slightly away. "Listen, rookie. Get my shirt off before I get Connecticut's and it's all even, isn't it? You lasted three whole missions, this should be a cinch."

It takes five rounds to get her shirt onto the floor, and it's Wyoming who does it, not Wash, with four-of-a-kind nines. Connie, after picking up bets for Maine as well, is in her undersuit. They both lose on the same round a few minutes later. Connie strips down to her underthings. South pulls her sports bra over her head and throws it at Carolina, missing by a foot.

"Remind me never to let you get wasted before a mission," Carolina says, unmoved and unmoving.

"Oh, does that make a change of plans?" quips Wyoming. He obviously thinks he is hilarious.

Connie rests her cheek in her hand, bestowing upon South an enigmatic smile. "Bra before pants, huh."

South starts to crack her back, stopping with a wince when the muscles cramp up and falling back into her seat. "Bra before pants," she confirms.

"Every single time," North says again.

 

It's a long time before the game begins finally to wind down. Maine is gone, the entertainment value of watching Wash embarrass himself in front of the group evidently having worn off; in her chair by the wall Carolina stares blank-eyed, eyelids looking bruised with more than tiredness, at the air a few feet in front of her. Her fourth bottle of beer, almost empty, dangles from her fingertips. Wash, after an eventual pitying gesture of magnanimity, is wearing South's TESTICULAR GENOCIDE shirt and looking strung-out and shadowed past his up-at-0500 military bedtime.

"This is going to be us one day, isn't it?" North says rhetorically. Someone has finally gotten his helmet (only his helmet) off, and his face underneath mirrors Wash's more than anything else. He spins a card under his fingertip until it falls, his reflexive grab for it missing clumsily. "One day it's gonna be us our friends are sitting around and talking about, trying to remember..." He trails off.

"Nah," replies York. "We'll make it through. One way or another, right? We haven't died yet."

"Yeah," says North. "Guess we're immortal, huh?"

"That's the spirit," York agrees, sounding as if he sounds false even to himself. "Spirituality's a bust."

"Yeah..." North repeats, looking at Maine's empty seat across from himself. "Yeah, that's one way to put it." He shakes his head as if trying to dislodge something before becoming subdued once again. "Hit the nail right on the head."


End file.
